"Up to this point, for as long as we've been working on Webb, you've only ever really seen a cartoon of the telescope. Towards the end of this year, you will actually be able to see the James Webb Space Telescope realised in hardware."

It's been a long time coming but we are now at the business end of building Hubble's successor.

The spectacular new observatory that has been designed to find the "first light" to shine in the Universe is getting real.

And Eric Smith, the programme director and programme scientist on this $10bn venture, is understandably quite excited by what is about to unfold in the next few months.

Whereas in the past, the talk has all been about the development and manufacture of individual components, such as Webb's instruments or its beryllium and gold mirrors - these have all now been produced (bar one or two items).

For years, the James Webb Space Telescope has been just an artist's impression. The coming year will see it really take shape

It will soon be time for a paint job and the emplacement of tens of thousands of fans' names

The tailfin. It's one of the most iconic features on the Bloodhound Super-Sonic Car (SSC), not least because it'll carry the names of all the project's thousands of fans who've contributed to its funding.

But the fin is also arguably one of the most safety-critical aerodynamic surfaces on the vehicle.

Philae landed on the smaller lobe of the comet, touching the surface four times before coming to a rest

The comet being trailed through space by Europe's Rosetta probe has no magnetic field of its own.

The finding is significant because it answers one of the major questions of the mission - namely, did magnetic fields play a major role in pulling together the material that makes up icy dirt-balls like 67P?